[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 65 (Thursday, April 15, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1987-S1988]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mrs. FEINSTEIN:
  S. 1179. A bill to provide financial assistance for projects to 
address certain subsidence impacts in the State of California, and for 
other purposes; to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
  Ms. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise to speak in support of the 
``Canal Conveyance Capacity Restoration Act,'' which I introduced 
today. Representatives Jim Costa (D-CA) has introduced companion 
legislation in the House.
  The bill has two major provisions, benefiting both drought resilience 
and the environment:
  First, it would authorize more than $653 million to restore the 
capacity of three canals of national importance. Restoring these canals 
would improve California's drought resilience and help the nation's 
leading agricultural economy comply with limits on groundwater pumping 
under the state's Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.
  Second, the bill authorizes an additional $180 million to restore 
salmon runs on the San Joaquin River. The funding is for fish passage 
structures, levees and other improvements that will allow the 
threatened Central Valley Spring-run Chinook salmon to swim freely 
upstream from the ocean to the Friant Dam.
  The bill authorizes a \1/3\ Federal cost-share for restoring the 
capacity of the Friant-Kern Canal, the Delta-Mendota Canal, and the 
California Aqueduct.
  Coordinated legislation in the State legislature introduced by State 
Senator Melissa Hurtado would authorize a \1/3\ state cost-share for 
restoring the canals' capacity. Under the coordinated Federal and State 
legislation, the locals would also be responsible for a \1/3\ cost-
share for the canal restoration projects.
  This legislation would help California water users and California's 
nation-leading agricultural industry comply with a recent State 
requirement to end the overpumping of groundwater. The stakes are huge: 
bringing groundwater into balance will reduce the water supply of the 
San Joaquin Valley by about 2 million acre-feet per year.
  Unless local water agencies and the State and Federal governments 
take action, a recent U.C. Berkeley study has projected severe impacts 
from these water supply losses:
  798,000 acres of land would have to be retired from agricultural 
production, nearly \1/6\ of the working farmland in an area that 
produces half the fruit and vegetables grown in the nation; and
  $5.9 billion would be lost in annual farm income in a region that is 
almost entirely reliant on agriculture and has been called ``the 
Appalachia of the West'' due to its severe economic disadvantage.
  One of the most cost-effective and efficient ways to restore 
groundwater balance is to convey floodwaters to farmlands where they 
can recharge the aquifer. California has the most variable 
precipitation of any State. When we get massive storms from atmospheric 
rivers, there is plenty of runoff to recharge aquifers--but only if we 
can effectively convey the floodwaters throughout the San Joaquin 
Valley to recharge areas.
  Here is where the challenge arises. For a variety of reasons, the 
ground beneath the major canals has dropped by as much as 10 to 20 
feet, which has caused canals designed to convey floodwaters to buckle 
and drop in many places. Other parts of the canals have not subsided, 
so the amount of water that the canal conveys must be reduced so that 
the canals don't overrun.

  As a result, these essential canals for conveying floodwaters have 
lost as much as 60% of their conveyance capacity. The bill I am 
introducing today would provide Federal assistance to help fix these 
Federal canals.
  Specifically, the bill would authorize $653.4 million in a Federal 
funding-cost share for three major projects to repair Federal canals 
damaged by subsidence to achieve their lost capacity:
  $180 million for the Friant-Kern Canal, which would move an 
additional 100,000 acre-feet per year on average;
  $183.9 million for the Delta Mendota Canal, which would move an 
additional 62,000 acre-feet per year on average; and
  $289.5 million for California Aqueduct repairs, which would move an 
additional 205,000 acre-feet per year on average. While parts of the 
California Aqueduct are state-owned, the majority of the repairs are on 
its federally-owned portion.
  If the Federal government covers a portion of the cost of restoring 
these three essential Federal canals for conveying floodwaters, it will 
give local farmers a fighting chance to bring their groundwater basins 
into balance without being forced to retire massive amounts of land.
  Critically, the ability to deliver floodwaters through restored 
Federal canals will allow the water districts to invest in their own 
turnouts, pumps, detention basins and other groundwater recharge 
projects. The South Valley Water Association, which covers just a small 
part of the Valley, provided my office with a list of 36 such projects 
for its area alone.
  The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) has determined that 
groundwater recharge projects are the best option to help the San 
Joaquin Valley comply with the new state groundwater pumping law. PPIC 
projects that the Valley can make up 300,000 to 500,000 acre feet of 
its groundwater deficit through recharge projects.
  A study commissioned by the coalition group called the ``Water 
Blueprint for the San Joaquin Valley'' estimates that required 
reductions in groundwater could cause a loss of up to 42,000 farm and 
agricultural jobs in the San Joaquin Valley. Another 40,000 jobs or 
more could be lost statewide each year due to reductions in Valley 
agricultural production, putting the total at approximately 85,000 jobs 
statewide. Most of these impacts will fall disproportionately on 
economically disadvantaged communities. These impacts will be 
significant unless we address them through collaborative planning, 
policies, infrastructure, recharge and necessary financial support.
  Let me now turn to the three critical canals that the bill would 
authorize assistance to restore. The Friant-Kern Canal is a key feature 
of the Friant Division of the Federal Central Valley Project on the 
Eastside of the San Joaquin Valley. For nearly 70 years, the Friant 
Division successfully kept groundwater tables stable on the

[[Page S1988]]

Eastside. This provided a sustainable source of water for farms and for 
thousands of Californians and more than 50 small, rural, or 
disadvantaged communities who rely entirely on groundwater for their 
household water supplies.
  But unsustainable groundwater pumping in the Valley has reduced the 
Friant-Kern Canal's ability to deliver water to all who need it. Land 
elevation subsidence caused by over-pumping means that not all of the 
supplies stored at Friant Dam can be conveyed through the canal. In 
some areas, the canal can carry only 40 percent of what it's designed 
to deliver.

  In 2017, a very wet year in which we should have been banking as much 
flood water as possible, the Friant-Kern Canal couldn't deliver an 
additional 300,000 acre-feet of water that it would have been able to 
convey had its capacity not been limited by subsidence. This 
significant amount of water would have been destined for groundwater 
recharge efforts in the south San Joaquin Valley, where the impacts of 
reduced water deliveries, water quality issues and groundwater 
regulation are expected to be most severe.
  The California Aqueduct serves more than 27 million people in 
Southern California and the Silicon Valley and more than 750,000 acres 
of the Nation's most productive farmland. But despite its name, much of 
the California Aqueduct is owned by the Federal government and serves 
portions of Silicon Valley, small towns and communities in the northern 
San Joaquin Valley, and farms from Firebaugh to Kettleman City. The 
aqueduct represents a successful 70-year partnership between the 
Federal Government and the State of California.
  In recent years, particularly recent drought years, the California 
Aqueduct has subsided. It has lost as much as 20% of its capacity to 
move water to California's families, farms and businesses. California 
is leading efforts to repair the aqueduct and is working to provide its 
share of funding, but the Federal government will also need to pay its 
fair share. The bill I am introducing today would authorize $289.5 
million toward restoring the California Aqueduct.
  The Delta-Mendota Canal stretches southward 117 miles from the C.W. 
Bill Jones Pumping Plant along the western edge of the San Joaquin 
Valley, parallel to the California Aqueduct. The Delta-Mendota Canal 
has lost 15% of its conveyance capacity due to subsidence. The bill I 
am introducing today would authorize $183.9 million toward restoring 
its full ability to convey floodwaters to farms needing to recharge 
their groundwater, and to wildlife refuges of critical importance for 
migratory waterfowl along the Pacific Flyway.
  This bill responds to a potential crisis that very possibly could 
cause the forced retirement of nearly 1/6 of the working farmland in an 
area that produces half of America's fruits and vegetables.
  These are Federal canals, and the federal government must help give 
these farmers and communities reliant on the agricultural economy a 
fighting chance to keep their lands in production.
  In addition, this legislation helps to restore an historic salmon run 
on California's second-longest river, the San Joaquin.
  I hope my colleagues will join me in support of this bill. Thank you, 
Mr. President, and I yield the floor.
                                 ______